Gaming machines are typically found in casinos and amusement arcades. They offer entertainment and gaming pleasure to many. Various types of gaming machines, including slot machines, are popular with the gaming public. Betting slot machines enable bets to be placed on events, for example, sporting performances and racing events. Reel slot machines have several rotating reels with various play icons arranged in the display panel's viewing windows or electronically on display screens.
Gaming machines are typically constructed as a kiosk, which is a stationary floor-mounted appliance having a front side with a user interface. In some cases, there is more than one interface in the upper section of the housing so that they can be observed or tracked from a user station in front of the housing. The interface may include a touch-screen, keys, buttons and a lever for rotating reels. Gaming machines may also include web-enabled personal computers programmed with software to enable on-line betting. In such cases, a mouse, keyboard, touch pad, or touch screen interface may be used.
An operator's panel included in the interface typically includes several control buttons are provided below at least one display. The operator's panel may be a touch screen with buttons that are illuminated, flashing, or displaying images. The touch screen eight may be the ventral height of a player standing in front of the device. Control buttons may be manually operated and may serve, among other things, to set reels of a reel slot machine in motion, or to stop them. The device's various functional building blocks, like the game controller, a currency authentication device, and/or a currency collection apparatus, can be accommodated within the housing's interior.
These kinds of gaming and entertainment devices are routinely set up in groups in a casino or in an amusement arcade. In this context, the devices can be arranged in rows next to one another, arranged radially, in a star-shaped manner, or around a column. There are numerous ways to arrange gaming and entertainment devices.
Racing games, such as slot-car or horse racing games for example, are known as games in which a plurality of characters race. Such races have a short time interval. Normally short time interval events last less than several minutes. The short time interval makes watching a race both possible and exciting. Attending live short time interval races is inconvenient for many, so various gaming machines on the market provide video of a current, or recorded event to a user.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,848,991 discloses a betting system where a bet is made on an event character selected from a plurality of event characters. Odds are determined in advance for each character. An award is provided on the basis of the odds that the character has finished in a predetermined finishing order, thus qualified for the award. Users may bet on a stronger character, and thus the odds thereof are lowered for the character at the last minute. The users having bet to win may only receive their wager back, and only take risks with no gain, even in a case where the character takes first place.
U.S. Patent Publication No. US 2009/0233671 presents a system and method that a) periodically sums up bets made by players and received by a gaming terminal, (b) calculates the latest odds on the basis of the latest sum-up result and (c) display the odds to enable further bets. This enables the odds to periodically change during the course of a racing game. The odds periodically change on the onset of the predetermined time deadline for the bet, the performance of the racing characters and on betting patterns.
One great challenge to gaming machine makers is the challenge to perfect the odd-making during the course of an event. Effectively perfecting the odd-making manages risks associated with having large payouts to numerous users for any particular event. Ideally any hold value amount retained by a system provider would exceed the net payouts of any particular event. This insures long term viability for those providing gaming entertainment to users.
Another challenge is to perform such in real-time so that a user can decide instantaneously when to place a bet. A further challenge is to make a system that can be used across multiple jurisdictions having diverse hold value requirements, where the hold value is a portion of a bet that is retained by the system provider.